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German Chancellor Scholz speaks out against new nuclear power
(www.reuters.com)
Growth in german wind capacity is slowing. Soo... then the plan is to keep on with lignite and gas? Am I missing something?
Installed Wind Capacty - Germany
All this debate and nobody brings up that, thanks to climate change, cooling nuclear power plants will become a roll of the dice? Same as it already happened in France?
Droughts are really, really bad for nuclear power. Solar and wind don't give a shit.
Doesn't even matter much which technology is better on any other point. If you cannot run it, it's worthless. Especially at times with increased power demand for example due to AC usage spiking thanks to the same heat that just poofed your cooling solution into oblivion.
Honest questions:
What's the difference in water usage between nuclear and, Germany's favored energy source, coal?
Hope much is drought a concern for Europe?
It is not our favorite energy source anymore, the plan is to get rid of themynot build more of them. Yes, there was an increase last year, but that was related to the gas situation with russia.
Northrine Westphalia just dumped the minium required distance for wind turbines, so we will see a huge boost of them (hopefully)
Drought is not as much a problem in Germany as it is on the southern states like France and Spain, but groundwater is going down. Everywhere. And like OP said, France had to limit the output of their reactors due to water shortages.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-07-13/france-cuts-nuclear-output-as-heat-triggers-water-restrictions
Wind and solar has to be the main focus as long as nuclear power is reliant on clean and sufficient water.
Of you want to know more, there is a separate wiki article just related to the European drought of 2023.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_European_drought